Know Thyself

[zdo 20]

Awesome posting!

Many thanks to both of you.

 

Does Primary Process developmentally end ?

Or does it just go unconscious (and run in parallel) ?

[Rande Howell 10]

ZDO -- Not sure I understand your question about Primary Process. I interpret Primary Process as the hardwiring of pattern that produces a stable perceptual map of the world. It is asserted that 75% of our organization of self is complete by the age of the 3 rd year of brain development. The real primitive pattern embedment does not go away, and, yes, parallel pathways can be build (habits and trained perceptual fields) to run concurantly with the old perceptual map. Fortunately, the brain and emergent mind have a tremendous level of plasticity to them. It is this aspect that offers us the capacity to change our ways of observing and interacting with the world we are creating. Our histories may never disappear, but we are able to become participants in the design of our futures. So we can alter the movement of our histories into the future. And trading is a great platform for this. You get real time feedback on your biases and beliefs about the decisions you make. We can become observers of the thought patterns (what I call voices on the stage of the self) and begin to choose which part of our internal dialog we feed and nuture. Becoming comfortable with uncertainty is essential for this. Rande Howell

[JBWTrader 10]

A very good discussion guys. Well done this is very interesting. Thanks for sharing.

 

I must apologize if I am crossing/mixing the coaching versus psycho boundaries here.

 

I note at least three levels of Jargon when People are communicating Psychology.Not necessarily in any order

 

The first is to discuss the physiology of root cause of behaviour eg and relate it back to parts of the brain etc this can be of some interest but is pretty clinical....

 

The second is to use the common known psychology learned/taught jargon when describing patients psychology/pathology,

 

And then there is the actual bodily/mind sensation/thought process that is actually going on inside of someone who does not have the complete set of tools to incarnate it all fully in the moment. Much undiscovered psychology/process is still in here....

 

As a coach ones job is to see the other...even before it is "seen" and understood in the person who one is coaching... or alternatively to provide an environment to let the other discover a process that is interesting in terms of self development and outer learning...often outer tasks/learning have feedback loops of an inner process going on..

 

From a psychology point of view the first couple of years of life are critical to the development of an individual. The mothers reverie is the most important aspect in the Child discovering the devine ...The subtle body and its sensation is the first level of boundedness for the child ......on it goes...Klein, Odgen,Jung have been some important contributers to practical modern day therapy ( amongst many others )

 

I personally have found the outer task of designing and developing trading systems that are statistically based a real personal challenge that has pushed my boundaries of stats knowledge and in some cases introduced myself again to some dissociated parts of myself and have revisited other known feeling states along the way...thus an eg of a typical alchemical process or individuation process

 

 

Best

John

[Uli Schmuli 10]

Regardless of how you define "knowing thyself," in trading there is only one measurement for me, and this is the most important thing in my journal: Did I follow my plan? Yes/No. Few things are so black & white.

[Rande Howell 10]

Ulli -- So true. I use the balance in the trading account as the measure. The trading account cuts through all the stories and it is black and white about effectiveness. And as a benchmark measure, I use the win percentage and the ration of profitabiltiy of wins to losses to measure progress. At the bottom, a successful psychological plan is used so that you can stay on trading plan. And you are assessing the market through your beliefs, biases, and states of mind that is your personal psychology. So looking at the trading account is an excellent way of gauging the strength of your trader psychology. If you're on plan and profitable, then your psychological plan is proceeding in an effective direction. Rande Howell

[zdo 20]

re: “Regardless of how you define "knowing thyself," in trading there is only one measurement for me, and this is the most important thing in my journal: Did I follow my plan? Yes/No. Few things are so black & white.”

 

and

 

re: “If you're on plan and profitable, then your psychological plan is proceeding in an effective direction.”

 

I’m not so sure about that emphasis on bottom line as an indicator of know thyself for traders

I know a guy who is all over the bottom line, it’s admirable how extremely well he sticks to his plans, and he quickly built a small fortune – but he is seriously low on a ‘know thyself’ / insight about himself scale … and that has now shown up in the last year or so in his failure to adapt…

Ulli, you mentioned plan. Well, one of the reasons behind starting this thread was noticing some subtle cyclicity / variability in my own ease of implementing sound proven plans. I could ignore that, measure my knowing self via the bottom line, etc. work with it in standard ways – or I could ask questions and explore the whole... and maybe there are a couple others who could benefit from such an exploration.

Every nth post someone comes along and basically tells us to get practical again and stop mucking around in what has of late unfolded as an exploration of developmental stuff

Rande mentioned ‘story’… Has this material changed my narrative re my development as a trader (before I started trading)? Not yet. But…

Has this material threatened others’ narratives? I take ‘what you are discussing is wrong’ posts as symptoms of that. This thread is for a few. There are huge crowds of bottom line, plan, discipline, edge threads to be ‘practical’ in…

Not a slam Ulli because you are one of the best posters on this forum... Just a reminder that a few of us want to explore some things and shepherding us back to the more objective fields is really off topic…

[zdo 20]

re “We can become observers of the thought patterns (what I call voices on the stage of the self) and begin to choose which part of our internal dialog we feed and nuture”

 

Rande, are you talking subpersonalities here? thx

[Uli Schmuli 10]

"Just a reminder that a few of us want to explore some things and shepherding us back to the more objective fields is really off topic…"

 

Sorry, if it seemed that way. I should have said more about what it takes to follow a plan, which is to know thyself.

 

It took me a long time to figure this one out. I have over 20,000 mp3 files in my library on how to operate the brain, have a good life, etc. Since I was 17 (I'm almost 54 now) I've studied all the self-help & self-improvement gurus starting with Maxwell Maltz's Psycho Cybernetics, and followed up with all the popular ones today: Tony Robbins, Deepak Chopra, Wayne Dyer, Joe Vitale, Don Miguel Ruiz, Eckhart Tolle and many, many others. But the one book that connected all the dots, and changed everything (for me anyway) was "Ask & It Is Given" by Jerry & Esther Hicks.

 

Knowing one's purpose for living is a great help when trading. As many others have said, trading is just an extension of Who You Are. Traders having difficulty making money have issues in other areas of their lives, too. I know. Not only have I been there, but I've coached countless other traders who cannot be taught how to make money until they are taught how to 'Know Themselves.'

[Rande Howell 10]

zdo. Probably preference. It is our mindset that interacts with our methodology. That is, our beliefs and hidden biases are the blinders that we interpret through. We can hold on to many stories (fish tales) about performances in most domains of our lives. But in trading, your trading account reflects directly on your competence in managing your psychology of trading. It helps to cut through the clutter and take responsibility for what ever story you are about trading. It's hard to stay in avoidance when you are taking responsibility for your trading account. By moving out of avoidance, we can observe what we are stuck in -- and grow from the experience. Rande Howell

[zdo 20]

It took me a long time to figure this one out. I have over 20,000 mp3 files in my library on how to operate the brain, have a good life, etc. Since I was 17 (I'm almost 54 now) I've studied all the self-help & self-improvement gurus starting with Maxwell Maltz's Psycho Cybernetics, and followed up with all the popular ones today: Tony Robbins, Deepak Chopra, Wayne Dyer, Joe Vitale, Don Miguel Ruiz, Eckhart Tolle and many, many others. But the one book that connected all the dots, and changed everything (for me anyway) was "Ask & It Is Given" by Jerry & Esther Hicks.

 

Knowing one's purpose for living is a great help when trading. As many others have said, trading is just an extension of Who You Are. Traders having difficulty making money have issues in other areas of their lives, too. I know. Not only have I been there, but I've coached countless other traders who cannot be taught how to make money until they are taught how to 'Know Themselves.'

 

Yes, the primary ‘know thyself’ is to know what you really want from deep within, and choose it as purpose – “choosing what is chosen…”

Let’s credit Blowfish, DugDug, and others for pointing that out early in the thread and Rande H. for pounding ‘true self honesty’ and 'avoiding avoidance' throughout.

 

Uli, I over-reacted to your distilling it to the question of “Did I Worked the Plan – Yes or No?” because at this time answering that question daily doesn’t provide me with much information.

Quick review

I run quarters from solstice to equinox to …

This quarter, in my intraday bread and butter active trading, so far I have

Losing days: 1 - Jan 8

Trading mistakes / off plan: 2 - One corrected immediately. The other I focused in and worked my way out of . It’s been over a year since I made a real bonehead mistake like ‘staying with a loser till it comes back’ etc.

Execution mistakes: 2 - Both corrected almost in the same breath they were made.

Results:

Entries – Most are immaculate. Some are a tick off from where they should be. A few are 2 ticks. Not very susceptible to jumping in early – an issue in the past.

Exits- Have been exiting profitable trades a little earlier than usual plan, but daily range and swing sizes haven’t been exactly large lately so can’t really don’t call that not following plan - it is what it is. 90% of time was glad I did get out. Happy with where I’ve been taking losses too – ahead of stops usually.

Bottom line is running about 0.2 – 0.3 % less than long term average daily net net. My ‘prayer’ - Give me some wild days to play and I’ll ‘fix’ that in a couple days…

Comments: I have cumulative 3 - 5 hours truly in ‘flow’ this quarter. However, large percentages of each day’s sessions are spent in the zone, in near intuitive trading (for me), glance and click decisions, in acceptance of results and self. Trading “emotions” – steady, no anger, angst, or suffering this quarter – so far . It has generally been ‘fun’ and trading has virtually no reach or duration outside my personal trading sessions.

 

Basically, folks, I’ve got my ’10,000 hours’ in – and, yes, many of them were tough and painful. Answering that “Did I work the plan?” question at the end of the trading day is truly important and I don’t want to discount it - but it does not get me to the subtleties and depth I need to explore right now and actually have always needed to explore -- hint hint noobies.

 

With that vitae, Uli, I really appreciate having you around. You can depend on knowing at least one person is listening to your posts. Type it in … and thanks!

 

 

 

 

I had a dream last night. The dream ego had three little fish in a bag / bowl and a series of dream obstacles to getting them to the main tank that had 1 other fish waiting and bubbles going etc. My wife was for a time involved in leading me / misleading d.e. to the location of the tank, etc. During the process, the dream ego was concerned about the condition and survival of the 3 fish and was considering whether it was best to just dump the fish in or let them ride in the bag till water temperatures matched when the tank was ‘located’ …

 

All the best

[DugDug 10]

Nice Zdo....

I had a phone call with a friend overseas today and when you mentioned the 10,000 hours I had a laugh. My friend is the classic studied what she loved for 4 years (micro biology), then decided to do something completely different as the money in science is not so great.

 

I wondered how many people study trading, do the time, actually get to the successful stage of being a consistently profitable trader (not accounting for absolute dollars made), and then decide to say "right been there done that - lets do something else". My guess is not many but definitely a few.

[JBWTrader 10]

Interesting dream Zdo

Anything significant happen the day before you dreamed the dream that night ?

 

Best

John

[zdo 20]

Nice Zdo....

I had a phone call with a friend overseas today and when you mentioned the 10,000 hours I had a laugh. My friend is the classic studied what she loved for 4 years (micro biology), then decided to do something completely different as the money in science is not so great.

 

I wondered how many people study trading, do the time, actually get to the successful stage of being a consistently profitable trader (not accounting for absolute dollars made), and then decide to say "right been there done that - lets do something else". My guess is not many but definitely a few.

 

Yep. If I remember correctly Mark Douglas went through a period where a trader “just isn’t who I am anymore”. Personally, I have had my interest and energy for trading ebb and flow across the years – but the passion and love for the game thankfully persists enough for me to stay active.

Also, I know there will come a day when developmentally / age I will be done with it. An older friend of mine just reported he is no longer has the interest in poker and going to Vegas twice a year like he did for years and years…

I do experience a similar phenom. more with physical skills. By the time I’m good at something, the project is just finishing up and then I’m not really interested in starting more similar projects… etc.

[zdo 20]

Interesting dream Zdo

Anything significant happen the day before you dreamed the dream that night ?

 

Best

John

 

The only thing I can think of - I had moved some funds between accounts in the last few days…had a little more hassle than usual

I must have been in a dream sharing mood. Told the dream to 4 others. Two went in a sexual direction with it. One went ‘Jungian’/ 'archetypical'. My wife just sipped her coffee and widened her eyes a little …

[JBWTrader 10]

Thanks. Interesting...the previous day events and interpreting the dream in the context of your life is critical...

 

thanks for sharing

 

Best

John

[zdo 20]

Why are we so smart?

Why are we so dumb?

Lloyd Pye - Everything you Know is Wrong

[zdo 20]

Here’s part of why I brought up the term ‘subpersonalities’

 

In our developmental process we are rewarded for certain behaviors and punished for others: thus, some selves are strengthened and others are weakened. We learn our lessons well and consequently develop “personalities”. It is strange to think that a personality is actually a system of subpersonalities (selves) that eradicates our psychic fingerprint as it brings us control – and thereby, power – in the world

From

Embracing Our Selves 1989

Hal and Sidra Stone

 

[ammo 10]

i make a habit of picturing myself sitting up on a ledge,with the right emotion,thought ,answer,action...in tune with god....and that me on the ledge watching the me below make the mistakes ,for pride ,stupidity,sloth,exhaustion, a million reasons,and constantly reassuring or correcting myself as life goes on...i'm of the belief that we intuitively know the difference between right and wrong,where the markets going,how things are,... we (humans) just spend our lives....most of us...never getting control of our egos..consequently letting the ego control us...with predictable results documented over and over thruout history

[zdo 20]

I have one challenge only: I can't face losses.

 

Losses are killing me, a losing trade feels to me like a stab with a knife in the heart, while I have no problem losing at conventional games, e.g. chess, a single losing trade is something that puts me down. It's causing me so much pain that it's hard to express. I feel clouds darkening the sky of my mind after a losing trade. Like facing a huge block that you know will be almost impossible to get thru.

 

That thing is having a bazillion effects on me, all of them adverse:

1) my mood goes downhill, affecting my own and others' personal life

2) I have a great urge to find a flaw in the system after a losing trade, and correct it

3) after a streak of losing trades, just 2-3 are enough, or a month of trading where I'm +/- 0 on balance, or slightly below 0, I immediately seek a new system

 

I've been thinking about the remedy - perhaps quality mentorship putting me in the right mindset is what I'm lacking. I'll keep pursuing the topic.

 

 

 

"Using techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging, neuroscientists have documented the fact that monetary gain stimulates the same reward circuitry as cocaine — in both cases, dopamine is released into the nucleus accumbens. Similarly, the threat of financial loss activates the same fight-or-flight circuitry as physical attacks, releasing adrenaline and cortisol into the bloodstream, which results in elevated heart rate, blood pressure, and alertness.

These reactions are hardwired into human physiology, and while some of us are able to overcome our biology through education, experience, or genetic good luck, the vast majority of the human population is driven by these “animal spirits” that John Maynard Keynes identified over 70 years ago..."

Andrew Lo

This Is Your Brain on Prosperity: Andrew Lo on Fear, Greed, and Crisis Management - Freakonomics Blog - NYTimes.com

 

Not wanting to ‘be wrong’ is crucial part of it, but in my experience the right / wrong is just one of a simultaneous and varying four pack of factors...

 

Some of us come to trading with these ‘threat associations’ globalized, ubiquitous, and at the ready… each threat joins a crescendo triggering associations with ALL other threats past (and ‘future’ / projected), Each loss is associated with, yes, even a painful death itself…with most of the ‘action’ occurring in surges of consciousness, then ‘repression’, suppresson, what not… (…my guess is about 78% of any current generation/population of traders fall into a gradient of this group…)

 

Some traders come with associations but they are less universal, lower quantity (…I estimate about 19% of any current generation/population of traders fits into a gradient of this group…)

 

And a few come with very few of these ‘associations’ / triggers… (roughly 3% … how do you spell paretopareto?... )

 

This can serve as a scale of the ‘emotional vulnerability’ of a trader…it’s kind of scary - a huge percentage of seriously self honest traders could not accurately say in which group they would really be if they were hooked up to biofeedback….)

 

…factors of genetics AND learning…but not the kinds of learning limited to cognitive functions and ‘discipline’ … ‘thinking’ can help but to believe that thinking alone can ameliorate these vulnerabilities is naïve and misguided…

[Cory2679 11]

"Using techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging, neuroscientists have documented the fact that monetary gain stimulates the same reward circuitry as cocaine.........

 

On a program called "Mind Over Money" that came on public television, I saw something similar that compared monetary gain to sex and food.

 

NOVA | Mind Over Money | PBS

 

I thought the program was worth watching.

 

Cory

[minoo 11]

Thanks Zdo for your reply in the thread 'Flow Thyself'

and diverting me to a more appropriate thread 'Know Thyself'

 

I re-post the good link to read the quotes by Aldous Huxley

 

In my opinion this page is absolutely worth reading

 

Aldous Huxley | Know Thyself

 

Please note:

The trading systems which I initially created & tested were very different than the one's I started to achieve some success with after knowing more about Self & Psychology (S&P). Knowingly I started off devising the system which enabled me to adhere to my stop losses and accept changes contrary to my current BIAS. These two were major contentious issues with my Primitive Mind and had to make do with over simplified system till I was comfortable in taking losses timely and more consistently.

 

Now I trade more with Preferences and Confluence derived from market internals and trade mostly in uni-direction off such conformance, so I mostly do not get caught on the wrong side of markets. Other most important thing I learned from the Market is to be Patience (while learning to trade and on simulation account one may foolishly indulge more than necessary and think they would not do the same in live markets) Hence the most valid position in my system is COP - Consciously Out Position. To me its much important to know when my system will not work with me and market 'both' than to have an overall profitable system for any given conditions in the market. I rather only employ my system when those probable conditions to profit in the markets are in Conformance. And practice discipline by staying out for the rest of the time.

 

l still struggle at times to do this consistently. Pre-Opening Preparation and Patience are both necessary part of my thy trader system.

 

Thanks Minoo

Edited March 30, 2015 by minoo

[zdo 20]

Clearly written... and it makes a lot of sense

 

When you don’t know who you really are, you remain unconsciously trapped in a false fight with basically being who your brains think the “somebody else meme wants you to be”. Thoughts and beliefs are ‘given’ to you...

performance workers - which traders are - doing typical ‘know thyself work tend to fall into comparison traps... activities like seeking (and reseeking... and reseeking...) character references from themselves, etc...

perennials cycle of a waxing inner Dunning–Kruger effect...then a sudden, unexpected enanthropic waning... a rushing to the opposite extreme ...

 

When you ‘know thyself’, all that stuff is dropped ... simply unnecessary. When you really ‘know thyself’, your experience - but not necessarily your expressions - arise via ‘thou art that’.

[minoo 11]

You cannot know about your self unless you bury your Ego and start being brutally honest with your conventional self first when learning

 

The difference between the L-earner and Earner is the Big L, you cant get away or do away either with your losses or emotions. And they are related. So learn to handle them Humbly (with less reactions, emotions or drama) and as a learner you get plenty of chances to nail them. Dont go against the natural process which all human beings go through to learn new things or you will pay heavily not only with your time, effort and money but psychologically as well.

 

The first thing you need to learn at this game is:

How to Loose Humbly & Timely every time.

 

If you cant face to learn How to Loose than sooner or later after much effort time and hard work, you will tend to become worse. Your mind will become a petri-dish for reenacting psychological problems (for denying the first truth of this loosing game)

 

No amount of pretense, patronizing or self bashing with your self will do. Not many can plan to learn; How to Loose. This is un-natural and thought of as negative but you have to be purposeful and get pass the phase honestly. Bring yourself around to read the truth of your own doings; off your own defined system by your own self and hopefully what is & very strictly is truthfully jotted in your own journal. If you have not yet step upon this yet, you have not taken the first step to truly begin your learning or earning

 

If the above is realized than Perhaps you bring yourself at the starting line for making a system for your honest self to learn to trade (to deal timely with your losses and knowing better your trader self)

 

The journey of learning begins than . . . . .. .

(For me before this things were realized by my conventional self, it was only a myriad of financial and emotional struggle . .. .)

 

Once you learn to take losses mostly on time, that does not mean you have learned how to take your earned profits. I still have not learned how to exit at targets and may not ever. But I am glad to have trained to learn how to let my positions run with my trailing stops. One never knows how much the market wants to give or take back. I am happy to trail along & let the market make that decision, so one less decision every time I am engage in the market. Basically I want to master two things When to enter the market with stops and how to manage them. Thats it Folks.

 

Keep it Simple and Short, so by the efforts of your own logic you keep thy stupid away.

 

Enjoy Minoo

Edited April 6, 2015 by minoo

[zdo 20]

"... the human spirit will not invest in compromise." Robert Fritz

[minoo 11]

Will De Lucy of Amplify Trading, who were recently awarded by CFA posted this video on their FaceBook page and I found the very harsh truth a Professional Player (Terry Griffiths) had to endure very humbling. Absolutely worth listening to Terry's sincere comments.

 

 

I post this to mark one of the best days of my trading life, yet I left so much on the table.

Compromise my rule of trailing with stop loss and instead got out (early) on some chart depicted Target.

 

Trade-Management rules Precedes Technical Analysis

 

Enjoy Minoo